Magical Messi mesmerises in El Clásico
MADRID (AP): LIONEL MESSI scored his 500th career goal for Barcelona to give the Catalan club a dramatic 3-2 win over 10-man Real Madrid in the last minute of the ‘Clásico’ yesterday, leaving the Spanish league title race wide open.
Messi netted his milestone goal – his second of the night – with a low leftfooted shot from inside the area after a cross by Jordi Alba two minutes into stoppage time.
That goal left the two rivals level at the top on 75 points. Barcelona lead on the head-to-head tiebreaker, but Madrid have six games left – one more than Barcelona.
It was the second consecutive win by Barcelona at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium, coming after a 4-0 rout last season that put Madrid in crisis and eventually led to the replacement of coach Rafa Benitez by Zinedine Zidane.
This year’s victory could keep Madrid from winning the league title for the first time since 2012 and give the Catalan club their third straight La Liga trophy.
“We can’t be happy,” Zidane said. “When you don’t put the game away, things like this can happen. We are disappointed because we didn’t deserve to lose.”
It was another outstanding performance by Messi, who played part of the game with a bloodied mouth after being hit by an elbow by Madrid left
back Marcelo.
“He is the best player in history,” Barcelona coach Luis Enrique said of Messi. “He makes the difference.”
Messi’s winner at the Bernabeu came after Sergi Roberto made a great run from Barcelona’s defence, leading to Alba’s low pass across the area as
Messi came charging to one-touch the ball into the corner past the diving Keylor Navas.
Messi’s first goal came after he got past Luka Modric and Dani Carvajal with a run inside the area after picking up a pass by Ivan Rakitic outside the box in the 33rd.
Messi is the all-time leading scorer in the Clásico with 23 goals.
LEADING SCORER
He has scored 14 goals in his last 10 league matches and is the competition’s leading scorer with 31 goals, seven more than teammate Luis Suárez. The Argentine playmaker has 47 goals with Barcelona in 46 games this season.
It was a thrilling match at the Bernabeu, with the teams attacking from the start and giving both goalkeepers plenty of work.
Casemiro had put the hosts ahead from close range after Sergio Ramos struck the post in the 28th. After equalising five minutes later, Messi also helped set up Barcelona’s go-ahead goal by Rakitic in the 73rd, a powerful left-footed shot from outside the area.
Ramos was sent off with a straight red card in the 77th after a foul on Messi to stop the playmaker from a one-on-one situation in a breakaway. Despite that, Madrid still found the strength to equalise in the 85th with substitute James Rodríguez. He redirected a cross by Marcelo only three minutes after he had entered the match to replace Karim Benzema.
Cristiano Ronaldo had a few good chances but was not able to capitalise on them.